Correspondence — Mr. C. E. Be Ranee. 41 



(p. 586, Vol. YIL)j Mr. Edwin Brown calls in question the fact of 

 perforated Limestone occurring in Millers Dale, and supposes that 

 Mr. Bonney may have mistaken vesicular cavities in Toadstone for 

 the borings of animals in Limestone. 



Mr. Bonney very justly complains of the unfairness of Mr. 

 Brown's insinuation, which, we regret to say, did not strike us in 

 reading Mr. Brown's letter before publication. We have received 

 from Mr. Bonney a specimen of the perforated Limestone from 

 Millers Dale, referred to in his article, and it is, as our readers 

 would expect, a true Limestone, the perforations of which agree 

 exactly with those from Ulverston, in Lancashire, originally de- 

 scribed by Miss Hodgson (see the " Geologist," Vol. vii., 1864, p. 42), 

 and subsequently by Mr. J. Eofe, F.Gr.S. (See Geol. Mag., Vol. 

 VIL, 1870,p. 4, PI. L) 



The estimate our readers and other scientific men have formed 

 of Mr. Bonney's contributions to science, would prevent any one 

 accepting the suggestion in Mr. Brown's letter. We are sorry 

 this paragraph formed a portion of an otherwise valuable communi- 

 cation : and we do not doubt that Mr. Brown will be as ready as we 

 are to regret what he must now see was an unjust criticism on the 

 observations of a brother F.G.S. Edit. Geol. Mag. 



THE BLUE CLAY OF THE WEST OF ENGLAND. 



SiK, — Miss Eyton states (Geol. Mag., p. 545) that the shell- 

 bearing gravels often rest " upon a bed of blue or grey clay . . . de- 

 scribed ... in Lancashire and Cheshire, by Mr. Binney ; and more 

 recently by Prof. Hull," and mentions that Mr. Hull gives its 

 thickness at Llandudno at 150 feet. To Prof. Hull's name she gives 

 a reference to a paper on the " Glacial Phenomena of Lancashire 

 and Cheshire." I wish to state (1), that I am the writer of a paper 

 with that title, read before the Geological Society, on June 22nd. 

 (2), That Prof. Hull has not, I believe, written a paper with that 

 title. (3), That the Lower Till he has always described as precisely 

 resembling the Upper Till, being of the same red colour, general 

 character, and including the same erratic boulders. (4), That this 

 is so much the case, that Mr. Binney considers (in all his papers) 

 the two clays to be one, with an intercalated Middle Sand. (5), That 

 in my paper, above referred to, I describe a Lower Till, of the nature 

 mentioned by Miss Eyton, as occurring in Lancashire, at levels 

 above 300 feet, formed by an ice-sheet, and mention that in North 

 Wales a similar clay is eroded, and overlaid by the ordinary Lower 

 Boulder-clay of marine origin. (6), That I consider that at Llan- 

 dudno it never reaches a greater thickness than 20 feet. (7), That I 

 cannot admit, with Mr. S. V. Wood, that the Upper Till of Lancashire 

 is the representative of the Hessle clay, or any other recent bed. 



H. M. Geological Survey, Morecambe. C. E. De EanCE, F.G.S. 



